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The sales process is all too often a glaring source of inefficiency within businesses. Companies can address this problem by getting set up with CRM software and committing to a more systematic process.

Disorganization in the sales process

There’s nothing worse than losing out on a lead’s business because of structural disorganization. Clever marketing campaigns and good products won’t help much if sales representatives don’t contact prospects at the opportune moment. Removing this disorganization can have a big impact on sales.

Replace intuition with a systematic process

Intuition is often the source of disorganization in the sales process. Sales representatives are used to scheduling meetings based on their gut feeling, as opposed to sales metrics. By committing to a more systematic process, sales representatives will get in touch with more leads at the appropriate time.

Get in the habit of documenting often

This is where CRM software comes into play. With it, sales representatives can document meetings and save noteworthy data in relation to customers. The more data your business collects, the more you’ll know about prospective customers and their buyer personas.

The key here is to make documentation a habit. According to this Forbes article, this small difference can make a big difference in terms of sales numbers:

“As it relates to utilizing a CRM, I have found that by documenting often and letting the technology manage me, I was 10 times more efficient and my sales numbers backed up my argument. The discipline of using a CRM helped me build stronger relationships with my customers. I always remembered who to call and when to call them.”

When all sales representatives adopt this habit, you’ll have a valuable database of customer information. They can then refer to this data to prepare for customer meetings.

Identify the customer data you want

To get the most out of CRM, you need to identify exactly what you want to find out about customers. According to this Forbes article, this means prioritizing the questions you ask in qualifying forms:

“Optimize tasks by defining standard question and qualifying forms that will make it easy for reps to rapidly record critical information that your automated workflow can instantly record into your CRM.”

The more data you collect, the more trends and relationships you’ll find. Over time, you’ll learn how to create targeted qualifying forms that give you the insights you’re looking for.

Bring old customers back

Returning customers are more profitable than new ones. Bringing them back is the key for long-term growth.

By analyzing CRM data, you’ll identify certain patterns in a customer’s purchase history. This Entrepreneur article explains how you can use this to bring customers back:

“More engagement, with a good strategy in place, will equal more sales. You can’t be passive and just hope people will come back. You must have your staff engage your customers with new, and better, buying opportunities. With a good CRM in place, you can cross-reference the data with any new incentives you have on specific products to create more targeted prospects.”

If a sales representative sees that a particular customer places a similar order at the end of each quarter, for example, then they can reconnect with that customer a few weeks earlier in anticipation of the sale. This is a simple, yet effective way of bringing old customers back before they have time to check out your competitors.

Despite how some experts talk about it, CRM isn’t magic. But if you use it for what it is and document relevant data, then you’ll have the tools to make your sales process more systematic and efficient. To talk more about automated marketing and CRM, contact us today.